Wednesday, December 31st

We Will Rock You: Year-End Local Top Ten

by Jon Hunt

Okay, first off: I feel compelled to say that I would have placed The Lovely Dark‘s amazing Into The Roil at #2 on my list, only I loved it so much I fucking joined the band. This forced me to recuse myself from putting it on the list, but since I’m not on the album, I can still thoroughly and wholeheartedly recommend its amazing, culty, dark, Fairport-on-acid vibe, which will blow your god-damn mind — I 100% guarantee it. That said, there were a lot of other local records I adored this year — it was a pretty great year for music here in the Twin Towns (as it ever is) and at least some of the stuff I dug was stuff that didn’t get the hype or airplay it definitely deserved, so feel free to crawl through the list and live it and love it in 2015.

(c) 2015 Caitilin Angelica

1. Leisure Birds, Tetrahedron – I’m glad to see that Leisure Birds got some love from critics this year. For good reason: their album is an insanely gorgeous channeling of psychedelic energy, equal parts Can and Silver Apples with a little Kraftwerk thrown in for good measure. It avoids all the stupid cliches that most psych bands these days overuse (I could point you to a few overhyped “psych” albums this year as proof) and sounds like nothing else on the horizon. It’s “electronic” but sounds like it’s from Mars rather than Chicago or 1980 (if anything, it’s Mars circa the old Gerry Anderson “UFO” television show). One shame: NO LIVE SHOWS, or at least a shocking few. Guys. Seriously. To hear it live would be earth-shattering. Make 2015 the year you climb back on stage. Play it on Spotify.

2. Allan Kingdom, Future Memoirs – I’ve written about this one a few times already this year — this magnificent and abstract rap album absolutely deserves all the hype it’s getting. It sounds like nobody else in town, and I hope he stays that way, totally creative and more than a little weird. Play it on Spotify

3. Sonny Knight and the Lakers, I’m Still Here – The folks at Secret Stash have always been known for walking the walk while they talk the talk, if you know what I mean. Besides releasing amazing soul compilations, they get up on stage and actually play the stuff with the guys who invented it. Sonny Knight has been kicking it since the late 60s but sounds every bit as vital and energetic as he undoubtedly did back then, and the Secret Stash folks (“the Lakers,” an appropriately Minnesotan name, no?) are a whip-ass soul combo every bit as good as the Dap-Kings. Best song: “Hey Girl,” which sounds like it could have come out on some obscure 45 in 1968. Gorgeous. Play it on Spotify

4. Jeremy Messersmith, Heart Murmurs — it’s rare to find a super-hyped songwriter who deserves every bit of that hype, but Jeremy Messersmith is that guy, no question. He’s beloved locally and for good damn reason: he writes beautiful, heart-rending chamber pop, very much a modern Zombies or Left Banke, every melody a thing of utter beauty, carefully constructed for maximum soul-impact. “It’s Only Dancing” was my favorite joint on this record, with a hook that could nail you at 50 feet, but every song on here is near-perfect. Best: he makes “precious” seem like a sword-wielding strength rather than a weakness. Play it on Spotify

5. Sun Gods to Gamma Rays, A Ghost To Find — I want these guys to become utterly huge. Their marvelous, soulful, keyboard-driven trip-hop, lead by best-singer-in-town-probably Brianna Kocka, is straight-up beautiful, the kind of smoky and sultry album you put on with some candles on that melancholy evening sometime in the middle of February. “Make It Last” is the single, or should be — it’s got a nicely throbbing dance beat and oodles and oodles of sheer atmosphere. I know so many people who would adore this record, and I want every single one of ’em to buy it and give it a shot if they haven’t already. Be prepared to fall in love.Play it on Spotify

6. BNLX, Flextime — On which Ed Ackerson and co. reclaim spacerock as a thing, which should alone be a reason to pick this up — the 21+ minutes of “It Was The Light (Drone)” has the kind of Ackerson guitar wig-out you haven’t heard in a bit of a while, all wild wah-wah warbling and crazy-ass drone notes, and it’s just phenomenal. MORE OF THIS. That said: the album’s pop songs are tremendous too — “Flextime” might be my favorite song of theirs, featuring one of those perfect post-punk melodies and hooks that they’ve been messing with, and “This Is Love” (sung by Ashley Ackerson) is a wild stomper. Four songs, but pretty much a full-length, and you gotta get through all 21 minutes to make it count, dig? Play it on Bandcamp

7. Deleter, Komposition and Zweite Komposition — Will someone make Knol Tate a star, or at least a Cult Figure Of Some Note, immediately, please? God dammit, there’s nobody else who thinks channeling Mark E. Smith circa 1981 is even worthwhile, but goddamn if he doesn’t do it and in a way that makes it sound not remotely derivative and totally, utterly fun as well. This is a brutal, angular record, the kind of thing you wish the Pixies sounded like, or maybe they sounded like this in your head but then never in real life, if that makes sense. It doesn’t get any more head-pummeling and heavy than “I Am Nomad,” which features a drum sound that literally lives inside your skull and enough angry shouting and guitar angst for a lifetime. Fucking hell. Play it on Spotify

8. Frankie Teardrop, Raiders — One of those bands that everybody loves and you suspect might be just all hype, but then fuck, they’re just great, the kind of rock and roll your mother warned you about. Listen to the title track and tell me it isn’t one of the most perfect punk/new wave songs of 1981, traveled forwards in time and sounding every bit as fucking vital as it should. If it was all just pummeling guitars I wouldn’t even be here, but man, it’s just as much about melodies and lyrics, and yeah. Man. Here’s a band you gotta see live. Play it on Bandcamp

9. Faith Boblett, Tell Me — I will not rest until Faith Boblett is a huge star. Her 2nd album, produced by the aforementioned Knol Tate, is a stone-blast of slightly-twangy guitar pop, with some of the very best songwriting you’ll hear all year and a “voice of note” for sure. It’s just the kind of thing that would be enormous in a perfect world (the one where people just straight-up appreciate amazing songwriting), and she’d be doing big arena tours, but you know, this isn’t a perfect world and I feel like the Current doesn’t know what to make of it (is it too pop? Is it country? Will the thirtysomethings understand it?) but man, fuck that. You will know what to make of it: it will make you fall madly in love with it, and you’ll wanna play it ten times in a row or I’ll eat my hat.Play it on Bandcamp

10. Howler, World Of Joy — You all know for a fact that I was ready to hate the fuck out of Howler. They’re just the kind of thing I can’t stand — youth-obsessed, pretty, super-white pop in love with itself. But goddamit, they won me over on this album despite myself, and I have to give ’em props for it. This is pretty much real rock and roll, and legitimately a little bit dangerous besides. Ignore irritating single “Don’t Wanna” and listen instead to the pummeling punk of “Yacht Boys” or the slick garage rock of “World Of Joy” or the compelling and mellow-but-terrifying “Here’s the Itch That Creeps Through My Skull.” These guys have the goods. They do. Play it on Spotify